Slide rail assemblies have been provided for use in furniture, cabinets, equipment racks, server system racks, and such, in which drawers, equipment units, work surfaces, and the like are extendible from within the furniture, cabinets, equipment racks and server system racks. Slide rail assemblies typically have at least two telescoping members, which include a forward slide rail and a rearward slide rail. The rearward slide rail is typically mounted to a cabinet, equipment rack, or the like, and the forward slide rail is telescopically extendible into a cantilevered position, disposed forward of the rearward slide rail. The forward slide rails are usually mounted inward of the rearward slide rails, such that the outwardly disposed slide rails are mounted to the cabinets and the inner slide rails are mounted drawers which extend forward of the cabinets. Prior art slide rail assemblies have included both friction slide rail assemblies and bearing slide rail assemblies. Friction slide rail assemblies typically have at least two telescopically extendible slide rails which include tracks that define mating bearing faces for slidably engaging, such that one of the slide rails is extendible to cantilevered positions with respect to the other of the slide rails. Bearing slide rail assemblies have at least two telescopically extendible slide rails, except unlike the friction slide rails, bearing slide rails include moveable bearings, such as ball bearings, roller bearings, and the like.
In some applications, the forward slide rails are latched into forwardly disposed positions with respect to the rearward slide rails. Prior art slide rail assembly latches are typically released by users pushing on portions of the slide rail assembly latches at the junctions of the rearward and the forward slide rails, to release the forward slide rails from being latched in forwardly disposed positions. The forward junctions between the mating slide rails often provide pinch points at which the users may be injured when operating such prior art slide rails. When prior art slide rail assemblies are used to support large drawers or large equipment racks in cantilevered, forward positions, it is often difficult for the users to simultaneously reach around opposite sides of the large drawers or equipment racks and release the slide rail assembly latches on the opposite sides at the same time, making the slide rail assembly installations more difficult to operate and increasing the chances of injury to the users by having fingers or hands caught in the pinch points between the telescopically extendible slide rails.